


Imaginary John

by R_Salie



Series: The Dark Stories [1]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Angst, BAMF John, Can Be Read As Sherlock Holmes/John Watson, Death Wish, Gen, Johnlock - Freeform, Kidnapping, M/M, Not Really Character Death, Not Season/Series 03 Compliant, One Shot, POV Sherlock Holmes, Reichenbach Angst, Sherlock Being an Idiot, Stabbing, Suicidal Thoughts, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-24
Updated: 2014-02-24
Packaged: 2018-01-13 15:36:35
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 861
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1231843
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/R_Salie/pseuds/R_Salie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock has been captured during his hunt for Moriarty's web. He has tried to keep John safe, he can't fail now. He has been held captured and tortured and now he is giving up on life. Hallucinations are keeping him company. John just can't really be there.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Imaginary John

**Author's Note:**

> Here is first of my dark stories. This is one shot.

Sherlock’s hands were shaking. It was involuntarily. His legs couldn’t carry his weight.  
John hold his hands against his torso and then let them fall to his lap. John’s thumbs pressed lightly his cheeks, made him rise his chin up. John wanted that he would look at him. Sherlock slowly lifted his gaze from the ground. His eyes were empty. John hold his neck and pressed his forehead against his own.  
“It’s all over now”.  
But it wasn’t.  
Not to Sherlock. He was still there. In his mind. It had taken over his mind palace. It had locked all of the rooms. It was darkness and shadows. Blood and smell of mould, petrol and iron. It was damp and cold. It was the thin mattress under his knees, against his heavy head for so many nights. His own heartbeat as the only sound he could hear. He was in the darkness. He was in the dark. There was no light. His conductor of light wasn’t there and without John it was dark. But for John he was gone, for John he was there. For John he fought. For John he had fall.

He was so tired. Exhausted. Eyelids closing without will. Slap on a cheek. Flash of light to eyes. Wakefulness for a moment. Which was truth?  
Was John there? Or was it --.  
Hands around him.  
Had it happen? Was it happening?  
His mouth tasted the blood, but there were hands around him. He could smell John. Or he imagined John. He had seen John before there and it wasn’t real. This wasn’t real. It wasn’t real. It couldn’t be real.  
Sherlock wanted it so much to be real.  
But for John, he could take it. For John, he would die. He would die again.

The pain was there. Constant pain all over his body. Everything ached. His lips were covered with cuts, skin dry on lack of water. Broken nose filled with dried blood so that it was hard to breath. He was ready to die for John.  
“Let –me-- die”, said his harsh aching voice.  
“No, Sherlock”, it was John’s voice. He heard it still. The ghost of his best friend speaking to him as his capturer, his torturer, his killer. It was not his John.

He had given his everything. All that was left was his fragile life and that he would give gladly for John.  
He was tired for screaming. Crying. Begging. He couldn’t fight anymore.  
He was worth more when he was dead. 

He was going to let go. He hoped it wouldn’t hurt so much. But of course dying would be painful. He was ready. There was no afterlife for him, no comforting thoughts about that, so he comforted himself with the imaginary John holding him. The John, who wasn’t real.  
But he spoke to that John as he was real. He kept his eyes open to see him, the thing that his tired brain decided to show him. John was the last thing he wanted to see just before he would die. But it was also cruel, to make him see John when he knew what he had to do to end this. He had to make them so angry that it would be the end of him. 

So Sherlock did it. So slowly. Controlling his shaking hands more than he thought he could.  
He took the knife, just forgotten, on the mattress in front of him. The same knife that had opened the ropes in his wrists.  
“Sorry”, he said with a harsh dry voice as he sunk the knife to imaginary John’s side. He was sorry for the imaginary John. But even for that image, the failure of his brain, he was ready to do everything. He was ending it.  
“What? Sherlock!”  
Hands bushed him to his side on the mattress and Sherlock didn’t move. He waited for the final thing. Shot from the gun which his capturer had left for the last. But it wasn’t there. There was no shot.

Imaginary John tried to get up. He shouted. There were all different voices. Sherlock was drifting again between consciousness and darkness.  
Then there were hands that pressed him against the mattress. It was coming, the lovely death. He was ready.  
“Sherlock, why?”  
He still heard the voice of imaginary John speaking to him.  
All the lights. Hands on him. Keeping him steady, in place, needle in his neck. That wasn’t the way he thought he would go. It was far too kind.

Kindness of it wasn’t kindness. Not when he opened his eyes.  
It wasn’t over.  
It was just bright. It was calm. It was soft.  
And warm.  
Those things he noticed before pain.  
It was different pain. It was only the fracture of the pain before.  
Slowly became wakefulness. Awareness.  
It wasn’t the same place. The light was different, mattress was firm, not hard against a concrete floor. It wasn’t the same place. 

Sherlock slowly turned his head. There was a window on his left side, light came through white curtains. He was in the city. There was traffic on a street. Someone else was breathing in the room.  
John.

**Author's Note:**

> Please, do leave a comment after reading.


End file.
